


Comb

by Aithilin



Category: Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle
Genre: Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-20
Updated: 2016-03-20
Packaged: 2018-05-27 22:13:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 708
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6302320
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aithilin/pseuds/Aithilin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kurogane was not used to brushing hair, but he had seen it done before.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Comb

**Author's Note:**

> Despite the timing of this, it was written independently.

There was a technique to brushing long hair— soft, easy, gentle movements that soothed out tangled worked in from sleep, from wetness, from harsh winds. There were long, sweeping movements to make; ways to stroke a soft brush deeper and deeper until thick hair flowed like silk through fingers. Until the shine returned and long hair cascaded down narrow back and across relaxed shoulders. 

He had sat and learnt calligraphy and numbers while his mother’s handmaidens and attendants worked their tasks to care for the Lady of Suwa’s long, long tresses. Their movements in his peripheral as he learnt how to make ink and hold his brush were steady and gentle— timed with the rain in his memory (because it only ever rained in his memory of lessons with his mother; sunny days were for running outside with toy swords and splashing into the rivers or clambering up trees). He remembered the long strokes as the young women tending to his mother teased him for his careful kanji practice serious face. 

He stood guard in corners and ignored teasing from a too-wise young princess while young women born into the nobility took care of Tomoyo’s hair for her. He rolled his eyes as she smiled and chatted, and teased him about his training and glum expression (or scolded him for his refusal to obey her orders). As young women, intimidated by the looming shadow in the corner, or by the door, or next to the window, watched them work their combs and brushes and tools through the hair of an Imperial Princess. As they worked to carefully smooth and unknot and pin the decorations for the day in place. As the newest additions to the entourage tried to mimic the long, practiced strokes they had grown up experiencing from their own mothers and servants, though their hands trembled and Tomoyo soothed them by teasing the dark creature that protected her. 

Kurogane knew how the movements went, how dark hair in his country would shine. How the straight, thick strands would slide like water through fingers far less calloused than his. How the brushes were meant to move when hair was wet, or dry, and how ornaments and combs could be twisted until they rested in elaborate styles of the court. 

Fai’s hair was not straight. It was thick, but it already flowed, already curled. It didn’t fall in simple lines that seemed obedient and beautiful. But it shone like sunlight on ice— neither the rich warmth of gold, nor the cool flow of quicksilver. Fai’s hair slipped through his hands when he tried to help tame it; it shied away from the touches he was mimicking from memory. 

Fai’s hair was just as obnoxiously playful as Fai himself. 

But Kurogane liked the act. He liked grumbling as he pulled the mage to him and worked a brush through wet hair. Glaring as Fai beamed over his should with teasing remarks about how gentle his “Kuro-chan” was. 

Sitting this way, after long weeks with little self-care, with fewer luxuries in some of the worlds they visited, Kurogane learnt braids and twists and ways to tie the unruly waves of Fai’s hair. He learnt styled from different worlds that Fai took a shine too. Watched as Fai played with clips and ties and ribbons in the mirror— far more practiced that Kurogane could ever be. 

He learnt that his hands were too rough to really appreciate how soft Fai’s hair could be. He was too clumsy to work more delicate styles Fai liked to play with. He was too impatient to work out knots and tangles without making at least one remark about just chopping off the whole mess. 

But those little sessions— either at night before he tossed the brush aside and intentionally mussed up the work he had just done, or in the morning when they dressed and Fai would laugh and drag him outside for some new adventure— always ended the same. 

Kurogane had a very vivid memory about the last kiss his parents shared. The way his father lifted strands of his mother’s hair as if it was a treasure. He remembered that gesture, the soft look that followed, the promise it was meant to be.


End file.
